Players: 2-4
Playing Time: 2 hours
The Components
Cavum comes in a large bookshelf box including the following:
Board: A large, linen-textured four-panel board. It features gem and score tracks around the edges of the board; in the center it has spaces for the cities and mines of Cavum. The artist choose to use a very simple palette of colors. I'm sure the intent was to give it an old western look, but the end product is actually pretty plain (which I find very surprising given past designs of the artist, Mike Doyle).
Cardboard Bits: A variety of cardboard bits are used in various parts of the game. They're all printed on linen-textured cardboard.
104 tiles denote the possible actions that you can take in the game. Most are tunnels, dynamite, or precious stone veins, which are placed on the board. Others depict a "buy" option and a "prospect" option, which aren't placed on the board, but instead help a player track what actions he's conducted on a round.
In addition, 4 sequence cards are used to determine turn order and 12 circular "2-chips" are used to increase the value of unused orders.
Like the board, all of the cardboard bits mentioned thus far are quite plain, with muted palettes.
54 discs denote six types of previous stones. I hadn't noticed when I was playing that each stone seems unique.
Finally, 15 order cards show exquisite jewelry that you can make with specific gems. They're entirely gorgeous (if gaudy) and are the one bit of standout artwork in the game.
Wooden Bits: 44 wooden cubes (stations) and 4 cylinders (victory point markers) in the player colors (blue, green, yellow, red).
Player Boards: A set of four very sturdy cards, each of which supplies spaces for a player to place his action hexes and also lists quite a bit of information about the turn sequence.
Overall, the components of Cavum are quite high quality. There's also some pretty good attention payed to usability in the design of the game board and the player cards. However, it's generally too plain* for it to earn top marks; nonetheless I've let it eke in "4" out of "5" for Style.
* Ironically, I thought the most beautiful bits in the game were the punch sheets, which show gems and other marks scattered around the items you actually punch out. Too bad you throw those out after punching everything.
The Gameplay
The object of Cavum is to earn the most points through the sale of gems and the creation of jewelry.
Setup: The board is laid out with five starting tiles depicting some entrances along the sides of the central mining area and a nexus at the very center of the mine that contains a vein of precious yellow gems. The other precious gems are placed on tracks along the edge of the board.
Several vein and tunnel tiles are placed near the map for optional purchasing. In addition, sequence cards are placed on the board, to be auctioned shortly.
Each player gets an action board and several piles of tiles, which mark the actions that he can take over the course of the game.
The order cards are shuffled, and five are drawn and placed face-up.
About the Map & Tiles. The map is initially filled with blank spaces (other than those starting tiles). Tunnel tiles (which can have 2, 3, 4, or 6 exits) will be placed on those blank spaces (and sometimes on top of each other). Veins will later be placed on top of tunnel tiles, and then filled, typically with 6 gems of a specific sort.
Dynamite is just like tunnel tiles, meaning it comes with 2, 3, 4, or 6 exits. However, it also shows dynamite in the middle, and will blow up at the end of a phase.
Order of Play: The game is played over three turns, each of which has five phases:
- Setup Round
- Take Actions
- Score Cities
- Explode Dynamite
- Sell Precious Stones
Setup Round: A short sequence of bidding and allocations heads off each round.
Bid for Sequence Cards. First, players bid victory points for the sequence tiles. Each tile depicts a turn order (from 1-4) and a specific type of dynamite (with 6, 4, 3, or 2 exits). This bidding is conducted as a series of auctions, one per sequence tile.
Take Tiles. Now all players take the 12 hexagonal tiles that mark the 12 actions they can take during the turn. These are always: 4 tunnels (one of each type), 1 vein, 2 buy options, 1 prospect, and 1 dynamite (with a number of exits determined by the sequence card purchased).
Take Order Cards. Finally, in the new sequence order, players can one at a time take one face-up order. Each of these orders shows a piece of jewelry, the gems required to build it, the points if the jewelry is completed, and the cost if it is not. For example one of them requires green, blue, yellow, and white gems, earns 27 points, or penalizes -3.
Players can take multiple orders if the turn order gets back around to them. After every one has passed, any remaining pieces of jewelry get a "2" marker placed on them; they'll be worth two immediate victory points if taken during the next turn.
Take Actions: As is common with many Kramer & Kiesling games, this is the heart of the game. Each player has 12 specific actions that they can take over the course of this phase. In sequence order, each player will take 1-4 actions. A player must always take his prospect action last. After all players have taken all of their actions (and they may end at different times), then this phase of the turn ends.
The different actions are:
Lay Tunnel. You can place a tunnel tile connected to another tunnel, connected to a city tile (in certain cases), or on top of another tunnel tile (provided the new tunnel has more exits).
Lay Dynamite. This works just like a tunnel except it explodes at the end of the turn (unless it's been covered by then).
Build Stations. You can place a station cube on the tunnel tile you just placed provided that it's not on top of any other tiles; else you can place a station cube in a city that connects through another of your stations via a series of tunnels that aren't interrupted by anyone elses' stations.
That whole concept of tunnels (including dynamite tiles) connecting stations without going through other players' stations is a very important one in Cavum; it's also used for prospecting, as we'll see shortly.
Discover Vein. You can place a vein on top of a tunnel tile that's not adjacent to another vein or a city. After you place a vein, you choose a gem track and take 4 gems from it (or less if there are less) and place them on the vein.
Use Option Tiles. The two options give you a bit of variety in your actions. When you play one you may buy a tile off the board. You'll be buying a tunnel tile or a vein tile, limited by what's available. You then must immediately play the tunnel or vein. Else, you can turn in the option tile for 2 victory points.
Prospect. This is always your last action, and it's where you pick up all the gems you'll need to score victory points. You collect gems by "drawing" a series of connections on the board.
Basically, you select a starting station and draw through as many veins as you can before coming to an ending station. In the process you may not pass through other players' stations, empty city spaces, or the same tile twice. You may pass through other stations of your own.
When you prospect, you pick up a gem from each vein you pass through. Afterward, any veins that have been emptied are removed (returning them to the "buy" pile). This reveals the tunnel tile hidden under it.
Score Cities: Players get points for all cities that they've built in, but only if their station is connected to a station on the board. Each station scores for the number of empty spaces in the city.
Explode Dynamite: Visible dynamite explodes, removing all tiles in its hex and the top tile of any adjacent hexes.
Sell Precious Gems: Finally, players earn points from precious gems in two ways: through an auction and through order cards.
Gem Auction. Each gem track shows values from 1-9. As you take gems off the track (for placement on veins), you take them off the bottom of the track, revealing ever increasing numbers. The highest revealed number is the highest possible sale value for gems of that type.
During the gem auction phase, a Dutch auction is held for each color of gems. Bids occur in sequence order, with price starting at the aforementioned maximum. Whoever wins the auction may sell as many gems as he wants of that color for the auctioned price. He must sell at least one. Any sales are taken as victory points.
Order Cards. In sequence order, each player may reveal any orders that he's completed, turning in his gems and taking the associated victory points.
Ending the Game: At the end of the game, a few things happen:
- There's a final city scoring.
- Unfulfilled order cards score negative points.
- All players sell all remaining gems. This is done in ascending order of victory points. The lowest-point player sells gems one at a time, each for the highest value still shown on the associated gem track at that time. This continues until he's no longer the lowest-score player or has sold all of his gem, then it continues on the next player ... . This mechanism gives a slight to medium edge to players who are behind, because they'll get to sell some of their gems for a higher value.
The player with the most points wins.
Relationships to Other Games
Wolfgang Kramer & Michael Kiesling have produced many action-point games, among them Mexica, Java, Tikal, Torres, and Australia. This one is pretty unique because it very certainly gives players a specific number of actions that they can take over a turn, but largely constrains what they can be and also allows them to be taken at different speeds. The result is quite interesting.
Cavum is also a connections game. It has very specific rules for what you're trying to connect, and gives opponents ways to block your routes immediately (by using stations or stacking tunnel tiles) or in the future (by blowing up tunnels with dynamite). With its stations, cities, and tunnels, I could practically see Cavum as a railroad game, with just slightly different theming.
The Game Design
Cavum is what's frequently called a "brain burner". It's a thoughtful game of how you can build careful connections in such a way as to manage the maximal prospects at the end of each turn. And, it does this well.
First of all, there are great opportunities for both tactical and strategic plans. On an individual turn you might see some great opportunities that your opponents have left for you, but over the course of all 12 of your actions, you really need to have a consistent plan that'll move you toward victory.
Second, there's some nice risk-taking. Since you can take at maximum four actions together, sometimes you have to set things up and hope you can take advantage of them when it comes around to your turn again.
Third, there's good player interaction. That might come from purposefully grabbing opportunities other people set up, or it might come from carefully timing your actions so that you don't try and prospect right when someone else is.
My concerns with Cavum all are time-related. Since it's a brain burner it can really grind to a halt if you have a player in your group who's prone to "analysis paralysis". Even without that, you can have some real downtime between your turns, despite the limited set of four actions. Finally, overall, the game takes about 30 minutes a player, which is a bit on the long side considering its variety of play.
Nonetheless, I like Cavum and I think it'll be enjoyed by other players of serious strategic games, particularly if they feel able to regularly place a 2-hour game on the table. I give it a high "4" out of "5" for Substance.
Conclusion
Cavum is an interesting and thoughtful game of carefully managed actions and connectivity. It'll be enjoyed by players who really like to think about their gaming.
